20th Century Women, now playing in limited release, is named after its complicated women. There are three of them to be exact played by Annette Bening, Greta Gerwig and Elle Fanning. To the movie's great credit, the two male characters are no less fascinating. Take note, men: while the men have their own distinct characters, half of the reason they're so interesting is their empathy and curiousity about the women they share their lives with. One of the guys is a teenager just getting started in life (Lucas Jade Zumann) and eager to soak it all in. The film's quietest character is William (Billy Crudup). He's moving into middle age but headed nowhere in particular; the women have always come to him but he still doesn't know where he's going.
On a very busy day just before the holidays I was able to catch Billy Crudup for a few minutes at the tail end of his press duties for 20th Century Women. While far more articulate than his character, he was similarly self-effacing, deflecting praise more often than not to pass the achievement on to co-stars, directors, and writers. Suddenly his theorized resistance to being A Movie Star (a long-since forgotten topic of discussion from the early days of his career when he turned down high profile gigs) made a great deal of sense. And since he won't say it himself, let it be known that this modest actor is very good in a tricky part in this wonderful film.
lost William in 20TH CENTURY WOMEN (2016)
Here's our conversation...
NATHANIEL: Annette Bening recently said that she had known a lot of guys that reminded her of William. She's the right age to have lived through the film's time period and dealt with those guys firsthand. ut you were only a little kid. How did you access that time frame and culture?
BILLY CRUDUP: I was ten or eleven in 1979. Actually I remember it quite well. It was a pretty vivid time in American politics. There was no shortage of different ideas of what an American man was meant to be now after the 60s revolution, after Nixon, Carter's Presidency, the emergency of Ronald Reagan -- there was a struggle, I think, to undersatnd what your role was. Who would model the type of man you were meant to be?
William himself is so specific a character - how did you find him?
I do remember actually quite a few men from that era that seemed more than a little lost. That wasn't such a stretch for me to understand and picture. I also think William was really really well written by Mike. Even though he's not terribly articulate and he didn't always have a lot to say, there's a gentle kind of appreciation for him in the writing.
Definitely.
That was something that I really identified with.
With Natalie Portman in JACKIE (2017)
You've been paired with many complicated women onscreen, particularly this year since you're sharing scenes with Annette Bening here and Natalie Portman in Jackie. I find that you have a stellar rapport with your female co-stars. One great example: Jesus's Son and Samantha Morton.
[Excited] Oh yeah!
Why do you think you're so attuned to your female co-stars?
Part of it is just the kinds of parts I've been able to do. The relationships as they've been written are meant to be relationships that have depth and nuance and curiousity and self-awareness. I think all of these things build an audience's appreciation for that kind of intimacy.
That must be wonderful to play as an actor.
You know you're kind of blessed if you have any role that has dimensions.
That's true.
Billy with his famous female co-stars
I'm happy I've had those opportunities whatever the context was. When you're acting with people like Annette and Natalie and Greta Gerwig and right now I'm doing a show with Naomi Watts... [Thinking of former co-stars] Penelope Cruz, Marion Cotillard, Cate Blanchett -- I've worked with so many phenomenal actresses. I suspect that any dude that would have been lucky enough to get those parts would have built the same rapport.
I would argue that you're being way too humble.
[Laughs] Well, I appreciate that.
You also do quite a lot of stage work: The Elephant Man, Arcadia, Coast of Utopia. I was blown away by The Pillow Man that you did like ten years back.
What a play that was, right? Any actor would have chewed their arm off to get "Katurian" [his character in The Pillow Man]. That role was just out of this world.
Billy Crudup in The Pillowman. He has 4 Tony nominations and a win.
The last thing I did on stage was Waiting for Godot and No Man's Land in repertory with Sir Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart. Even though Shuler Hensley and I had the sort of tiny parts we were both exhausted by the end of it. I think I needed a little break after that.
Are you going to go back?
For sure. I start getting pretty antsy after a year or two of not doing a play. That experience is unlike anything else.
Just last year you had such a lynchpin role in Spotlight but I can't imagine it was an easy part. The character is so withholding -- you're really giving us no information.
I've been a fan of Tom McCarthy's for a very long time. His movies are so ambitious about the minutae of relationships and behaviors. But this was kind of a departure. The first conversations I had with Tom about this. -- When I saw that part originally, it seemed to me, on the page, to be without the kind of depth that I need in order to make it interesting for myself. Tom said 'Well, that's on purpose. We want you to do a little leg work on Eric Macleish and his story and you'll see what we're talking about.' There was a profile on him in 2010 --- he was a pretty prominent lawyer -- a couple of years after the story came out, he ended up going to see a therapist. Over the course of several weeks he revealed that he had been abused as a child. Underneath his manipulations of the press what he's most interested in doing is getting the victims the only thing he thinks they'll be able to get under this Draconian system. [Tom said] 'You have to play him like he's the only one in the system who is making it work! The problem is I'm not going to give you any dialogue for that!'
Uh-oh.
That was a very interesting exercize. As an audience member you think he's manipulating the case against the victims. Any compliment about Eric Macleish is about the writers [Tom and Josh Singer]. You could edit the film in such a way that the nuance doesn't play as interesting, much less have a critical role. You know something is happening with this lawyer. You just can't figure out what it is. It was a great opportunity to play with that kind of nuance.
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